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The Donald’s Twitter blurts are about as welcome as a volcanic eruption.
Having Donald Trump as US President is similar to what it must be like living on Hawaii’s Big Island in the shadow of Kīlauea volcano. Sometimes consecutive days will pass when everything is calm and you think that perhaps his White House staff have control of him, or he has lost his phone down the back of the seat in Air Force One.
Then, without warning, another rush of heat and confusion bursts out. And all the time, the possibility simmers that a really big explosion could still occur.
Occasionally, Americans express regret to me that I’m living here in the time of Trump’s presidency. They have nothing to say sorry about, of course. For a start, anyone who apologises for him probably did not vote for him so is hardly to blame and, anyway, it is a fascinating time to be here. I would not have missed it for the world.
Weekends are often the most interesting, because it appears the President has more time to tweet then. Memorial Day passed on May 28 and Trump tweeted,
“Happy Memorial Day! Those who died for our great country would be very happy and proud at how well our country is doing today.”
Well, they might be if they had died hoping for low interest rates and a bullish sharemarket, but I doubt those were the last thoughts of many who made the ultimate sacrifice. I have never been on a battlefield, so I don’t know for sure, but I surmise that a good number of them, if they could think anything at all today, would be deeply regretful that their lives had been squandered and that it is still happening.
It seems we take for granted that the rules we grew up with are normal and rational, yet maybe sometimes they are not. I thought that this week when I went for my first swim in a public pool here.
I had been told, but did not really believe, that 15 minutes before the top of every hour a siren sounds and everyone has to get out of the pool for 15 minutes. “Why?” I asked friends and neighbours. “Safety,” they replied, and seemed as perplexed that I would question this action as I was perplexed that they would accept it.
This week, our nearest countyowned outdoor pool opened for summer and I went along. There is a paddlers’ pool and a 25m lap pool but the main attraction is a wide 50m pool with a diving board and slide.
I had just entered the pool complex when a siren blared and an announcement was made. Children under five and their parents in the toddlers’ pool and people over the age of 18 swimming laps in the lap pool could remain, but everyone else had to get out.
This included everyone in the main pool, which was by far the majority of patrons. They all dutifully got out, because for them this is normal. I asked a pool lifesaver what was happening. He said that “for safety”, every hour there was a break of 15 minutes for people to “rest, re-hydrate, apply sunblock and to allow lifesavers a break”.
When I mentioned to someone that in New Zealand, if we were tired from swimming we got out of the pool rather than staying in and drowning, she seemed surprised by Kiwis’ recklessness. Whenever I encounter things I don’t understand in the US, I assume that a fear of litigation is behind it. Still, this one is perplexing – not only that the rule exists, but that people so compliantly accept it.
Whenever I encounter things I don’t understand here, I assume fear of litigation is behind it.